Celts Out of Gas: Philadelphia 83- Boston 67

[wfcooper@tiac.net (Bill Cooper)]

*** Sorry.  I sent this out last night, but messed up the address ***

	With the exception of Paul Pierce and a couple of the bench
players, the Celts didn't even show up for this one.  And After
Anderson went out with a bruised thigh, and the Celt had to play
Marlon Garnett for some major minutes, it was all over.  It's just one
of those nights in the NBA this year.

	The Sixers looked sharp and the Celtic's dull as the game
started.  The Sixer's jumped out to a 13-4 lead, off of two very
smooth Iverson J's off picks.  Meanwhile Theo Ratiliff was, in no
uncertain terms, intimidating all of the Celts with the exception of
Paul Pierce.  The Sixers fell off their fast offensive pace, but
continued to apply the defensive pressure.  The 2 clubs went the next
8 possessions without a point, before Mercer finally hit a jumper.
The Sixers pushed the lead up to 22-8, and then 24-10 after a gorgeous
Iverson behind-the-back pass to Larry Hughes.  A few moments later,
the Celts came up with their only real offensive bright spot of the
period, as Pierce rebounded a Mercer miss, and threw the ball back out
to Mercer.  Ron head faked towards Anderson, and then ripped the ball
back to Pierce, who laid the ball up and collected the foul.  None the
less, the Celts trailed 27-13 at the end of the 1st.  Walker was MIA
in the period.

	The Celts looked as though they might be gaining some purchase
and they opened the second with 4 straight points.  Then Battie picked
up his 3rd foul, and Kenny Anderson injured his thigh and had to lead
the game.  The Sixers pushed the lead back up to 15 at 34-19.  The
Celts go some nice help from Pierce, who fielded a McCarty alley oop
for a nice jam, and then fed Barros off an offensive rebound to help
the Celts cut the lead to 36-29 (I was kind of wondering how the C's
could be so close in a game where they were totally outplayed).  Dana
had to leave the game due to foul trouble, and was replaced by
Garnett.  Meanwhile Pierce had been forced to leave the game with his
third foul as well.  The Sixers began to overwhelm the C's, as Theo
Ratliff just terrorized any green uniform who got within 15 feet of
the basket.  The Sixers outscored the Celts 10-2 over the final 4:00
of the half to regain their 15 points lead 46-31.  Retliff had 6
blocks in the first half.

	With Anderson out for the game, Barros started out the half by
hitting a couple of threes, and the Celts cut the Sixers lead to 9 at
48-39.  That was pretty much the last arrow in the C's quiver, as the
Sixers steadily pulled away from the Celtics after that.  The Sixers
pushed the lead back up to 9 at 64-45.  With 2:51 to go Pierce picked
up his 4th foul of the game, keeping Iverson from scoring an easy
basket, and Dana was slightly shaken up on the same play.  With both
of them out, oddly the Celts closed the quarter with a 6-0 run to
close the period trailing 64-51.  The pace of the 3rd was incredibly
slow, as the two team combined for just 39 possessions.

	The Sixers sealed the game with a 17-5 opening run.  It was
finally broken halfway through the period as Walker hit his first (and
only) basket of the game, a jumper naturally.  The rest of the game
was just window dressing as they closed to within 16 points in a game
in which they were totally outplayed (83-67).

	A good sign of Celtic's fatigue is the turnover differential,
which they lost tonight 18-10.  Thanks to Pierce, the C's had a small
edge in offensive rebounds, but the Sixers still got off more total
shots, as they took 14 more free throws.  The Celts shot an incredibly
pathetic .313 from the floor.

Lineups:
Celts: Anderson, Mercer, Pierce, Walker, Potapenko
Sixers: Snow, Iverson, Lynch, Grant, Ratliff

Players:
Pierce: I'm beginning to wonder about Pierce.  Tonight he had 9
offensive rebounds in 30 minutes (also 22 points on 9-17 shooting, 3
assists and 13 boards overall).  Not that I don't appreciate the
effort, but can you ever remember a major NBA player who was so
confused about his basketball identity?  It's nice to be multifaceted,
but Pierce seems more like confused.  At one point, he was leading the
league in steals: I bet he hasn't had a multi steal game in a month.
for a while he was hanging out by the three point line: except for a
couple of late 3's, I don't think he took a shot from more than 10
feet from the basket tonight.  Then he tries out being a slasher.  As
talented as Pierce is, I think he would be well advised to settle down
and concentrate on putting together some kind of consistent game.

Toine: He was on Walk-about tonight.  1-11 from the field, 3 boards, 2
blocks and 4 assists in 36 minutes.  His first 2 shots of the game
were both threes: I think it was Antoine's version of Dowsing.  If one
or both of the shots had gone in, he might have convinced himself that
the Celts had enough luck\karma flowing their way to win.  Then he
would have given the game a real go.  Instead he just packed it in.
And the Fleet Center crowd showed him no love (luv?).

Anderson: Along those lines: Since Kenny only played 11 minutes (0
points, 1 assist) allow me a slight digression.  After Mike Gorman
repeated K.A.'s observation about the lack of affection so often
displayed by NBA refs towards the Celts, it occurred to me that Kenny
may in the long run, be remembered more for his absurdist use of the
word "Love" in the same sentence as "Officials" than his play on the
court.  Of course, the word has been used in many unusual ways before
(the male half of the species is particularity known for this), but I
believe that Kenny has raised the practice to new heights.  Imagine
the Possibilities: "I had an I.R.S. audit today and the
Agent-in-Charge didn't show me no love" or "Nato airmen displayed a
distinct lack of Love for the Serbian Capital of Belgrade this
evening" (that is not meant as any kind of political comment).
Anyway, back to hoops.

Mercer: Ron continues to behave as though there is a
degree-of-difficulty bonus for taking tough shots in the NBA.  I
swear, he makes shots harder than they have to be on purpose.  He
scored 12 on 5-17 shooting.

Dana: continues to display his new found confidence in his offensive
game.  Shot 4-6 and had 13 points in 23 minutes.  Just one assist
though.

Battie: showed some nice energy, as he had 5 blocks, to go with 8
boards and 6 points in 23 minutes.

Potapenko: Heinsohn commented that he did a fine job defensively
against Kevin Willis last night in Toronto.  Maybe so, but tonight 4
points and 3 boards in 17 minutes.  Pitino didn't play him any more
because he was of no use.  V.P. is kind of like that lefty relief
pitcher who specializes a getting left handed batters out: very nice
to have on the team, but would you pay him 5 million per (well, I
suppose the Orioles would).

Minor: 4 points and 6 boards in 18 minutes.  continues to plug along.

McCarty: got 27 minutes tonight.  Of course if the Celts aren't going
to press you really don't want him out there.  shot 0-6 (mostly
outside shots.  Did have 6 boards and a couple of blocks.  He's trying
something different with his jumper, but it's not working yet.

Garnett: He's just not any kind of point guard at all.  Of course you
could have said the same thing about David Wesley at one point.  Right
now,  though...   0 points, 3 assists and no instincts in 14 minutes.

Coaching: Not much you can say.  Why did Mercer play 42 minutes,
though?  After the day off tomorrow the Celts have too play 2 more
games in a row. 

Bill Cooper
wfcooper@tiac.net

P.S. A query to all the real oldtimers out there (i.e. people who can
remember back to 65 when Russ took over from Red as Coach).  Russell
mentioned tonight that he intentionally didn't have an assistant coach
on the team with him.  I never heard this before, and wonder exactly
how it worked (who kept track of fouls and such)?  I've always thought
being a player coach must be very tough and always assumed that an
assistant actually did a lot of the game coaching.